


Don't Eat The Bees

by Elayna



Series: The Live Hard Series [15]
Category: Die Hard (Movies)
Genre: Established Relationship, Kid Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-28
Updated: 2012-04-28
Packaged: 2017-11-04 11:40:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elayna/pseuds/Elayna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Matt take their daughter to see flowers.  Follows <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/248605">The Magic of a Young Girl's Soul</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Eat The Bees

It didn't surprise John that Matt's daughter was passionate. Of all of his personality traits, passion was one of Matt's strongest. 

Sometimes the things she found to be passionate about did surprise John, because they certainly weren't the choices he or Matt encouraged. 

"Earwig, Poppa, earwig!" she said, proudly displaying the black bug on her small hand. "Earwig!" 

"Yes, honey," John agreed. "That's a nice earwig." Somewhere along the way, he had determined to be enthusiastic about his kids' activities, and stop trying to mold them into his preferences. Though he couldn't say that her affection for bugs or Jack or Lucy's current lifestyle choices made it easy. 

"Maybe you should leave the nice earwig here," Matt suggested, barely masking an expression of 'ugh.' "This is his home, on the grass." 

She frowned, not overly pleased with the idea of abandoning her discovery, watching as the earwig crawled from one hand to the other. 

"Daddy's right, honey. The earwig should stay. He probably has earwig buddies around here. Besides," John added, "there will be more bugs on the flowers." 

Her face noticeably brightened. "More bugs?" She carefully placed the earwig on the ground. "Go earwig, go!" 

She took their hands again as they walked out of the small parking area, fashioned out of an empty meadow, and down to the highway. 

They paused to look both ways, Matt taking a moment to peruse the display sign for the Snack Shack. "Oh god," he moaned. "They only have coffee. How does any business survive with just offering plain coffee these days?" 

"There are a few Starbuck's in the backpack." 

This time it was Matt's face that noticeably brightened. Bugs and frou frou coffee drinks. His family was so easy to please. "You're my hero." 

"Bugs, Daddys!" She tugged at their hands, encouraging them to cross the highway to Daffodil Hill.  
~~~

It was biologically impossible, but Matt's daughter had seemed to inherit a bit of John. Or more accurately, a bit of Jack and Lucy. She certainly knew how to be contrary. 

Daffodil Hill was filled with acres of the flower for which it was named, mostly yellow and white, but with an amazing number of variations. Small, large, yellow with white centers, white with yellow centers, yellow and white with orangish centers, simple lines or ruffled petals, a single daffodil versus multiple flowers on a stalk. Really, John had never known so many options existed for one simple flower. 

She liked the tulips best. 

Not that there were many tulips, but every time they reached one of the wine half-barrels planted with multiple colors of tulips, she stopped and crooned, "Pretty!" And tried to make them open, which led to another patient remonstration by Matt of "No, honey, don't open the tulips. Just look at them and smell them. They're not for touching." 

Matt needed to learn to be a little tougher with her, a thought John suppressed. Lucy had initiated a few long talks with him when her honorary half-sister was on her way, talks about his flaws as a parent and his overly tough attitudes. John wasn't completely convinced Lucy's view of the past was entirely accurate, or his fault. He might have been a better father if Holly hadn't kept yanking his kids away from him. So they'd argued, but John had listened too, and tried to let Matt take the lead. Matt was her biological dad and should have the most say.

And if he had to step in and put his foot down where boys were concerned, well, she was only three. Juvenile crushes were more than a decade away. And dating was two, if he had his way. 

~~~

The gray and albino peahens fascinated her, as did the peacock, though it never spread its wings to show its full beauty, but the bumblebees completely enraptured her. 

"I blame your mother," Matt said, slightly under his breath, as their daughter jumped up and down and pointed at the blackest, nastiest-looking bumblebees John had ever seen, and crooned, "Bugs! Bees!"

"She's the one to blame," John agreed. His mother was the one to take her on nature walks and to the zoo regularly, and bought her all those nature books with full color pictures of insects. She'd never inflicted these things on her children or grandchildren, but her tastes were getting more unusual in her old age.

"Touch the bees!" their daughter suggested happily. 

"No, honey," Matt said, his voice sharp with alarm at the suggestion. "Don't touch the bees. They have stingers. They could hurt you." 

"Eat the bees!" was her alternate suggestion, because she also resembled Jack and Lucy in that respect, always eager to leap from one bad idea to an even more heinous one. 

"No, honey. Don't eat the bees. They'd sting your throat and it would hurt really bad." 

She gave him a frowning look of concentration, her dark brows so like Matt's, before smiling again. "Watch the bees!" 

Matt smiled joyfully back. "Yes, honey. Watch the bees." 

~~~

They stopped at the gift shack on the way out, to pick up a few postcards. "You have a lovely – " the clerk paused momentarily, glancing at John's bald head, clearly trying to decide on daughter or granddaughter. 

"Daughter," John finished for him, handing over a twenty. His by adoption and by love, even if not biology. "Yes, she's adorable. Thank you." 

"My gay dads!" she announced proudly and loudly, patting John and Matt on the knees. "Gay Poppa and Gay Daddy!" 

"And that would be Charlie's influence," Matt sing-songed quietly. John gave him a Look, trying vainly to think of something to blame on Matt's parents. 

The clerk looked taken aback, likely having slotted Matt into an 'older son' role, but he recovered quickly, smiling as he gave John his change. "You have your gay dads bring you back next year, okay? And try to make it a few weeks earlier. We're at the last of the season." 

"You have pretty bugs and pretty tulips," she told him seriously. "We'll be back." 

Matt, John could tell, was about to lose it, because only a child - their child - would compliment everything except the main attraction. "Thanks, it was a great visit," he said, snatching up the paper bag of postcards with one hand and hoisting her up with his other arm. 

"Pick-me-up!" she announced with great enthusiasm, as if John needed his own action explained to him, and wrapped her arms around his neck, cuddling into his embrace.

Matt followed them out of Daffodil Hill, laughing. 

~ the end ~

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a family outing earlier today and is one of those 'yes, let me write you quickly before you get long and complicated fics.' I don't know whether I should apologize to my niece for co-opting her into my fics, or to my nephew for ignoring him. He's also adorable, but much quieter. Geography and nature references are Californian and may not be relevant to New York. Pretend they're taking a trip?


End file.
